Image CreditChelly Bouferrache
On Tuesday three anti-ICE protesters were charged with assaulting an officer along with other offenses during ongoing protests outside of an Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in Portland, Oregon. A fourth individual was charged for allegedly “defacing the ICE building” with graffiti.
“[F]or weeks, individuals have repeatedly targeted the building and federal law enforcement officers with threatening statements, discharging pepper spray, and throwing rocks, trash, and bricks,” the U.S. attorney’s office for the district of Oregon said in a Tuesday press release.
Riley Freeman (26 years old) faces charges of “felony offenses of assaulting a federal officer with a deadly or dangerous weapon and possession of an unregistered destructive device.” Andrew Marcum (22) and Ian Joseph McCarthy (35) were also charged with a felony for “assaulting a federal officer.” The fourth protester, Jeremy Hummel (27), was charged with a misdemeanor for “depredation of government property.”
The federal building has been “under siege” for “more than 30 executive days,” with many rioters affiliated with “the anarchist extremist group Antifa” camping outside the building, The Post Millennial reported.
Officers arrested rioters at the same facility on June 14 when “No Kings” protests happened across the country. On June 20, six rioters were charged with misdemeanor offenses, including “assaulting federal officers and creating a hazard on federal property.” The Department of Homeland Security noted that on July 4 “violent rioters targeted an ICE facility in the Portland area — assaulting law enforcement, vandalizing federal property, and burning the American flag.”
Chelly Bouferrache, a journalist who’s been covering the Portland anti-ICE protests for the last 30 days, told The Federalist that the “cult-like” group protesting at the ICE facility uses “rhetoric” that “is increasingly more violent towards the officers.”
“I’m concerned there’s going to be a mass casualty,” Bouferrache said.
More arrests were made on Tuesday night, Bouferrache said in a post on X, as video appeared to show law enforcement deploying tear gas as protesters continued to riot outside the ICE building in Portland.
“We the people need sleep!” a Portland local named Cloud yelled at anti-ICE protesters in a video posted on June 29. The local filed a lawsuit on Tuesday against the city for not taking enough action against the riots, saying the locals have been “trapped in nightly torture.”
The Democrat-led Portland City Council held a “Community and Public Safety Meeting” on Tuesday, though the meeting did not bode well for citizens hoping for a reprieve from Antifa violence. More than 40 people testified, with the majority of speakers calling the rioters “peaceful” and ICE “violent” or “nazis,” and asking the council members to revoke the ICE facility permit.
Councilor Angelita Morillo, who described herself as “the only immigrant on city council” and who goes by the pronouns “she/they,” opened up the meeting by emotionally announcing, “I am personally grateful for everyone who is out there protesting.” Councilor Eric Zimmerman also seemed to suggest that ICE agents are “the great cowards of our time.”
“We want our city to be safer again,” said David Medina, one of the two testifiers who spoke about the dangers from the anti-ICE rioters. He was called a “nazi” by a heckler during the meeting.
In Texas last weekend, ten alleged members of an “Antifa terror cell” were arrested and charged with three counts of attempted murder after attacking ICE officers, The Federalist’s Jacqueline Annis-Levings reported.
Border czar Tom Homan said on Fox News that he plans on visiting Portland. “They’re not going to bully us.”
“We’re going to double down and triple down on sanctuary cities. … So what you’re going to get, sanctuary cities, is exactly what you don’t want: more agents in your communities and more collateral arrests,” he said.
Abigail Nichols is a correspondent for The Federalist. She was previously the opinion editor for the University of South Florida’s student newspaper, The Oracle. She is now working as the business manager at the University of North Florida’s student-run media outlet, Spinnaker Media, while obtaining a Master’s Degree in Social work.
